When I returned from my 6 months student exchange in Canada two months ago, the action was just about to begin. I had a fantastic time over there and got to experience at lot of cool stuff but the highlight of the summer was still to come: While I was abroad, I stumbled upon an online application form for an internship at the Austrian Space Forum (OeWF). Having already heard much about the OeWF on the news and also having participated as a Junior Researcher in their AMADEE-15 mission, I knew that this internship would be perfect for me as a high school student with strong interest in Space, Technology and Physics. So I wrote my application and impatiently awaited the answer. And would you believe it? After a skype job interview with Dr. Gernot Grömer, I got an email saying that I would spend 5 weeks in the upcoming summer as an intern at the OeWF Suitlab in Innsbruck.

Now, at the end of my internship, I can think back to a lot of cool things and impressions I got here at the Space Forum. Besides writing a list of astronaut biographies for the ASE conference, finishing the children spacesuits and fixing a 3D printer, I got to construct new pedestals for the two Aouda suits. You see, when they are not helping to deepen our understanding of human missions to Mars, our suits are resting on two wooden boxes that are on wheels and also contain a battery and an inverter to provide energy to the suit. But the current models are a quite old, which is why Michael Müller, a physics student from Graz and also OeWF member, designed new versions. But because he went back to Graz before actually building them, it was up to me to start the construction. Michael send me a 3D model of the new design and also his notes on how the wood would need to be cut. After creating a project plan, which was a first for me, I went and bought all the wood, paint, hinges and electrical stuff needed. Since very high precision was required, I triple checked my measurements before using a jigsaw to carefully make all the cutouts. Painting was an easy job and after screwing and gluing all the pieces together, I got pretty excited about the very neat looking box.

First assembly of the pieces (c) OeWF

Of course it was far from finished: The doors, the drawers, the wheels and the electrics would still need to be done but as the end of my internship was near, I explained all the details to Ali Al Bayati, an Iraqi aviation engineer who is also volunteering at the Space Forum. He will finish my work, as I know him, extraordinary well and I am looking forward to hopefully return one day and witness it myself. Until then, I am left with a big thank you to all of my colleagues for the great fun and all the interesting things I got to see.

Engineer Ali Al Bayati next to the unfinished project (c) OeWF

Author: Michael Berghold